Day Two took us to the Animal Kingdom. Our first stop was to get a Fast Pass at Expedition Everest. The girls were semi-excited about this ride. Prior to arriving, both Amy and Misha vowed to conquer their fear of roller coasters. They were quite successful.
Now, let's get back to bad hair days. I was having them, that's for sure, and my makeup felt as though it was going to melt off my face. So when Chris and the girls wanted to go on the Kali River Rapids, I took preventative measures. They thought I was a wuss, but we'd been on a similar ride at Elitch Gardens in Denver, and I got soaked. So, I wore my poncho. And yes, I probably looked ridiculous, but I stayed fairly dry. Thanks to Tasha for giving me the tip about ponchos. Even if it never rained, mine was useful.
Kristen was a trooper. She was just tall enough that she could ride almost all of the rides and was willing to go on all of them. Though she probably never really knew what she was getting herself in to most of the time. When we finally went on the Expedition Everest, she sat with me and screamed her ever-loving little head off the whole time. When we got off she asked, "Was that monster real?" I had to reassure her that it was just pretend, and she was okay with that.
We saw a wide variety of animals in the Maharajah Jungle Trek. The girls particularly enjoyed the tigers. You can see Kristen doing her impression of one:
We rode a number of rides that were fairly easy and enjoyable for Kristen and saw a few of the shows. We all enjoyed "It's Tough to be a Bug", but be ready for a few surprises.
Mid afternoon, Mr. Merrill Lynch left a message on Chris' cell phone that his wife, Betsy, would be getting in touch with us about the stroller. We finally connected via phone later that evening. She apologized for taking our stroller, but wanted it to be our fault for not having a name tag on it. You'd think they would have checked for their own name tag! Anyway, they were leaving the next morning, didn't have any transportation to bring the stroller to us and wondered where theirs was. When we told her that Guest Services wouldn't let us take their stroller, she was a little miffed--again that probably goes back to not having the transportation to go and get it from Epcot. They were staying at The Contemporary next to the Magic Kingdom. We told them we could pick up our stroller from the concierge, but they were on their own for picking up their own. Whew. Chris had faith that we would get ours back, I just figured it was gone. Interesting phenomenon with strollers at Disney though. They are everywhere and though the employees move them around to make room for more, people are generally comfortable leaving them. Funny because when I got back to the Denver airport, I was cautious about not leaving the stroller while I went in to the bathroom. But I digress, we were back at Animal Kingdom.
The workers had told us about the very new baby elephant and rhino that had been born in the past week. We were excited to take the Kilimanjaro Safari and see the newborns along with gazelles, giraffes, lions, alligators, hippos and a variety of other animals. We learned on another ride that all of these animals are trained to return to their specified cage every night. Even at Disney World they worry about poachers!
After a few character sightings, we left the park when it closed at 7 pm; we had plenty of time for swimming and dinner. We found a Macaroni Grill that met with everyone's approval. Our server was horrible. We waited and waited for food to arrive. By the end of the evening, he could tell that we were more than peeved. He brought out a huge brownie and two extra loaves of bread for us to take with us.
Chris gave each of the girls $20 to spend on Disney stuff. This was a few items that Kristen chose--much cheaper to buy them outside of the Disney parks.
The girls were excited for a little evening swim before bed time. A fitting end to another fun-filled day. You can imagine it didn't take any of us long to fall asleep.